The Islamic fundamentalist leader Osama bin Laden (born 1957), a harsh critic of the United States and its policies, is widely believed to have orchestrated the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, as well as the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden. But it is his role as the apparent mastermind of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that have made bin Laden one of the most infamous and sought-after figures in recent history.

The 6-foot-5, lanky, bearded leader--soft-spoken and effeminate, even when he rails against America--is a man of tremendous wealth, and makes an unlikely spokesman for the poor and oppressed people of Islam whom he claims to represent. Nevertheless, his call for a jihad, or holy war, against the United States and Israel has been heeded by like-minded fundamentalist Muslims.

Raised in Great Wealth

Born in Riyadh, the capital city of Saudi Arabia, Osama bin Laden was the son of Mohammad bin Laden, one of the country's wealthiest business leaders. Some sources state that he is the seventh son, while others claim that he is the seventeenth of some 50 children born to the construction magnate and his various wives. Young bin Laden led a privileged life, surrounded by pampering servants and residing in air-conditioned houses well insulated from the oppressive desert heat. He may have heard tales of poverty from his father, who started his career as a destitute Yemeni porter. He moved to Saudi Arabia and eventually become the owner of the kingdom's largest construction company.

Mohammed bin Laden's success was in part due to the strong personal ties he cultivated with King Saud after he rebuilt the monarch's palaces for a price much lower than any other bidder. Favored by the royal family, Mohammed served for a time as minister of public works. King Faisal, who succeeded Saud, issued a decree that all construction projects go to Mohammed's company, the Binladin Group. Among these construction projects were lucrative contracts to rebuild mosques in Mecca and Medina. When Mohammed died in a helicopter crash in 1968, his children inherited the billionaire's construction empire. Osama bin Laden, then 13 years old, purportedly came into a fortune of some $300 million.

A Passion for Religious Politics

Young bin Laden attended schools in Jedda, and was encouraged to marry early, at the age of 17, to a Syrian girl and family relation. She was to be the first of several wives. In 1979 he earned a degree in civil engineering from King Abdul-Aziz University. He seemed to be preparing to join the family business, but he did not continue on that course for long.

Former classmates of bin Laden recall him as a frequent patron of Beirut nightclubs, who drank and caroused with his Saudi royalty cohorts. Yet it was also at the university that bin Laden met the Muslim fundamentalist Sheik Abdullah Azzam, perhaps his first teacher of religious politics and his earliest influence. Azzam spoke fervently of the need to liberate Islamic nations from foreign interests and interventions, and he indoctrinated his disciples in the strictest tenets of the Muslim faith. Bin Laden, however, would eventually cultivate a brand of militant religious extremism that exceeded his teacher's.

Joined the Afghan War

As a student in the late 1970s, bin Laden was galvanized by events that seemed to pit both the Western world and communist Russia against Muslim nations. One of these was the Camp David peace accords between Egypt and Israel; another was the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan. In December 1979, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, bin Laden, like many other Muslims, rose to join the jihad declared against the attackers. He did not initially enter the fray as a soldier, but instead channeled his efforts into the organization and financing of the mujahedeen, or Afghan resistance. Over the next ten years, he used his tremendous wealth to buy arms, build training camps, and provide food and medical care. He was said to have occasionally joined the fighting, and to have participated in the bloody siege of Jalalabad in 1989, in which Afghanistan wrested control from the Soviet Union.

The United States, then embroiled in the Cold War with the Soviet Union, provided help to bin Laden and his associates. Although in many respects he worked side by side with the Americans to defeat the Soviets, bin Laden remained wary of the Western superpower. "To counter these atheist Russians, the Saudis chose me as their representative in Afghanistan," bin Laden later told a French journalist in an interview quoted by the Public Broadcasting System's (PBS) Frontline. "I did not fight against the communist threat while forgetting the peril from the West.... [W]e had to fight on all fronts against communist or Western oppression."

Formed "Al Qaeda"

During the war, bin Laden forged connections with the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the militant group linked with the 1981 assassination of President Anwar el-Sadat. Under the influence of this group, bin Laden was persuaded to help expand the jihad and enlist as many Muslims as possible to rebel against so-called infidel regimes. In 1988 he and the Egyptians founded Al Qaeda, ("The Base"), a network initially designed to build fighting power for the Afghan resistance. Al Qaeda would later become known as a radical Islamic group with bin Laden at the helm, and with the United States as the key target for its terrorist acts.

After the war, bin Laden was touted as a hero in Afghanistan as well as in his homeland. He returned to Saudi Arabia to work for the Binladin Group, but he remained preoccupied with extremist religious politics. Now it was his homeland that concerned him. In 1990 Saudi Arabia's King Fahd, worried about a possible invasion by Iraq, asked the United States and its allies to station troops that would defend Saudi soil. Eager to protect its interests in the oil-producing kingdom, the United States complied. Bin Laden, euphoric after the Afghan victory and proud of the power of Muslim nations, was outraged that Fahd had asked a non-Muslim country for protection. He now channeled his energy and money into opposition movements against the Saudi monarchy.

As an outspoken critic of the royal family, bin Laden gained a reputation as a troublemaker. For a time, he was placed under house arrest in Jedda. His siblings, who had strong ties to the monarchy, vehemently opposed his antics and severed all ties--familial and economic--with their upstart brother. "He was totally ostracized by the family and by the kin gdom," Daniel Uman, who worked with the Binladin Group, told an interviewer for the New York Times. The Saudi government, ever watchful of bin Laden, caught him smuggling weapons from Yemen and revoked his passport. No longer a Saudi citizen, he was asked to leave the country.

With several wives and many children, bin Laden relocated with his family to Sudan, where a militant Islamic government ruled. In Sudan, he was welcomed for his great wealth, which he used to establish a major construction company as well as other businesses. He also focused on expanding Al Qaeda, building terrorist training camps and forging ties with other militant Islamic groups. His primary aim had become to thwart the presence of American troops in Muslim countries.

Orchestrated First Terrorist Attacks

Bin Laden regarded even American humanitarian efforts as disgraces to Muslim countries. The first terrorist attack believed to trace back to bin Laden involved the December 1992 explosion of a bomb at a hotel in Aden, Yemen. American troops, en route to Somalia for a humanitarian mission, had been staying at the hotel, but they had already left. Two Austrian tourists were killed. Almost a year later, 18 American servicemen were shot down over Mogadishu in Somalia. Bin Laden initially claimed not to be involved in the attack, yet he later admitted to an Arabic newspaper that he had played a role in training the guerrilla troops responsible for the attack.

Several months later, on February 26, 1993, a bomb exploded in the parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing six and injuring more than 1,000. Though it has not been proven, bin Laden is widely suspected of being the mission's ringleader. Many believe it was the terrorist leader's first attempt to destroy the towers, which suicide hijackers succeeded in toppling in 2001. United States and Saudi leaders pressured the Sudanese government to expel bin Laden. In 1996 he left the country voluntarily, according to Sudanese officials.

Declared Holy War Against United States

That same year, bin Laden openly declared war on America, calling upon his followers to expel Americans and Jews from all Muslim lands. In a statement quoted by PBS's Frontline, he called for "fast-moving, light forces that work under complete secrecy." Interviewed by Cable News Network (CNN) in 1997, bin Laden said, "[The United States] has committed acts that are extremely unjust, hideous, and criminal, whether directly or through its support of the Israeli occupation." The following year he issued an edict evoking even stronger language: "We--with God's help--call on every Muslim who believes in God and wishes to be rewarded to comply with God's order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it."

After the Sudanese government asked him to leave, bin Laden operated out of Afghanistan. He is believed to have orchestrated at least a dozen attacks, some successful, some not. Among the worst of these were two truck bombings, both on August 7, 1998, of U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The Nairobi bombing killed 213 people (only 12 were Americans) and wounded 4,500. The Dar es Salaam attack left 11 dead and 85 wounded. This news, compounded by intelligence reports suspecting that bin Laden had been attempting to acquire chemical and biological weapons, prompted U.S. action. President Bill Clinton responded with cruise missile attacks on suspected Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan. In November 1998 the U.S. State Department promised $5 million to anyone with information leading to bin Laden's arrest.

Despite attempts to apprehend him, bin Laden eluded the American government and continued plotting against it. Not all of his efforts were successful. A failed plan to bomb Los Angeles International Airport on New Year's Eve, 1999--suspected to be one of several failed attacks designed to correspond with the millennium--was linked to Al Qaeda. Bin Laden is also suspected of orchestrating a botched attack on the USS The Sullivans, a U.S. warship stationed off the coast of Yemen. "[I]n what seemed to us a kind of comic presentation of what happened," recalled New York Times reporter Judith Miller, "the would-be martyrs loaded up their boat with explosives and set the little dingy out to meet The Sullivans and the [dingy] was overloaded and sank."

The same group, with bin Laden at the helm, is widely believed to be responsible for the October 2000 suicide bombing of the USS Cole, carried out in the same waters only a few months after the Sullivans failure. The terrorists had apparently learned from their mistakes. The attack killed 17 U.S. navy personnel and left many wounded. Yemeni officials later reported that five suspects in the incident had admitted to training in bin Laden's Al Qaeda camps.

Prime Suspect in Attacks on America

Bin Laden's hatred for America had become well known, but nothing had prepared Americans for the most extravagant and heinous plot allegedly hatched by the terrorist leader: the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. On the clear, late-summer morning, two hijacked commercial jets flew into the twin towers of the World Trade Center. About an hour later, another hijacked airliner slammed into the Pentagon in the nation's capital. A fourth hijacked jet did not reach its target, crashing in Western Pennsylvania instead. When the massive towers collapsed in flames, thousands perished. Among those lost in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania were the 19 hijackers, most of whom have been linked to Al Qaeda operations. Bin Laden denied involvement in the attacks, but he praised the hijackers for their acts.

The U.S. government nevertheless regarded the terrorist leader as their prime suspect. President George W. Bush demanded that Afghanistan's Taliban government turn him over or face war, but to no avail. In early October, U.S. forces began striking Afghan targets, declaring a war on terrorism and on the countries that harbor terrorists.

Bin Laden's followers, who support a radical fundamentalist brand of Islam, remain devoted to their leader and continue to heed his call for a holy war. Ever wary of the price America has put on his head, he has reportedly chosen a successor: Muhammad Atef, an Egyptian Muslim who married bin Laden's daughter in January 2001. After 2001, TV and radio reporters in the Middle East continued to receive information from bin Laden in the form of video and audio tapes--some suspect, some more reliable--proving his continued existence and defiance of the United States.

U.S. intelligence agencies continued their hunt for the elusive bin Laden but to no avail. In March 2004, U.S. and Pakistani intelligence forces began a hunt for bin Laden among the dry mountainous tribal areas of the Pakistani-Afghanistan border. U.S. spy planes joined the mission. Some 70,000 troops were deployed to the area and battles raged with militants. Prior to the mission, defense analyst Lt. Gen. Talat Masood noted that even if he was in the area, bin Laden might not be found. "He has the advantage of geography, of terrain, of a tribal society which will give him cover and which will show him the loyalty," he told CNN.com. "So, unless somebody betrays him or by chance he is caught, it may be very difficult." Once again, bin Laden was not found.

When the United States invaded Iraq in March 2003 in a search for weapons of mass destruction and in an effort to dethrone Saddam Hussein, bin Laden found a new outlet for his anger. After the invasion, bin Laden sought to turn Iraq into the front line of his war against the United States. Islamist terror groups flocked t o the region and bin Laden released audio tapes praising them and Iraqi insurgents for their repeated suicide bombings and attacks on U.S. soldiers. In a 33-page address issued by bin Laden in December 2004, he urged insurgents to keep fighting and envisioned turning Iraq into an Islamic state, which could later be transformed into a worldwide Islamic empire. He deplored U.S. plans for a January democratic election. In an audio tape, released about the same time, bin Laden urged Muslims to attack both Americans and Iraqis with positions in the interim government, including voters and election workers. He warned that anyone who participated in the January elections would be considered an "infidel" and would be fair game for attack. It appeared bin Laden felt safe, wherever he was hiding, because it was the third statement he had issued in two months.

Prior to his December audio missive, bin Laden had released a videotape four days before the 2004 U.S. presidential election. The video, which aired on the Arabic language network Al-Jazeera, was the first video footage released in three years. Officials determined the tape was authentic and recent. In the tape, bin Laden spoke directly to the American people and told them the 9/11 attacks were simply the result of U.S. foreign policy in Arab lands. He mentioned Lebanon and the Palestinians. On the tape, bin Laden said, according to CNN.com, "Although we are ushering the fourth year after 9/11, Bush is still exercising confusion and misleading you and not telling you the true reason. Therefore, the motivations are still there for what happened to be repeated."

Bin Laden allegedly spent the next year or so in a secret hidden base along the northern border where Afghanistan and Pakistan meet. He continued to elude those searching for him; his long silence also raised questions about his health, and some wondered if he was even alive. The first audio taped message from the Al Qaeda leader in over a year appeared in January 2006. In the 10-minute message, he threatened new attacks in America, gloated about recent European bombings, and also offered a long-term truce to the United States if certain conditions were met. While confirmed to be his voice, bin Laden also sounded weak and labored.

Another tape was posted on the Internet in May 2006 in which he affirmed his role in the planning the 9/11 attacks and also declared that the recently sentenced Zacarias Moussaoui did not play a role in the plot. The message featured a still photograph of bin Laden and his voice; it was again confirmed to be bin Laden. A third was posted in July 2006 under similar conditions, in which he praised Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi the recently killed Iraqi Al Qaeda leader and vowed to continue his crusade against the United States and its allies. It was soon unclear if bin Laden was really alive. By September 2006, a French newspaper was claiming that bin Laden had died on September 4 in Pakistan; a Saudi intelligence source would not confirm his death but did admit he was quite ill. Bin Laden's status remained unclear, though much time and manpower was still being spent looking for him.